Blog of Jesse Magnan. That would make it my blog, where I post reviews, share stories and utter out loud the occasional thought that I probably should have kept to myself.

Wednesday, November 4, 2015

Ethnicity/Race/Gender and Superheroes

In one of the many groups I am part of this really talented
person made himself a truly epic Batman cosplay costume. This young
man also happens to be black. Shouldn't be a big deal. A costume is a costume
and fun is fun. Some people tried to tell him that "historically Batman is
white", usually right after the phrase "I'm not racist but".
Then they would go on and say he should dress as a character that is already
black.

There is so much wrong here I am not sure where to start.

First off, if someone does a lot of hard work creating a
costume for a character they love then either applaud the hard work or shut
your mouth. Unless you are applauding their hard work or you have something
constructiveto say (I see you did Technique
A for the gloves, you can do Technique B instead and save yourself some time,
moneyand aggravation) or a question
(What material did you use to create the six pack ab effect?) then you have
nothing to say.

Second, bringing up a fictional character as some sort of
historical context for the validity of your racism is mind boggling backward.
Even Lenny from ofMice and Men wouldn’t use that kind of
argument.

If we go into the REAL history of many of our beloved
superheroes we will find racist motivations behind many of the reason a
character was white. Batman
was created at a time when no publisher would have allowed a black superhero.Same with Superman.Nineteen thirties America was not an
enlightened place, and we still have a long way to go.

And even many of the non male, non white superheroes
feel a bit like token
characters. Not all of them, just many of them.

At the same time I do think that doing a gender swap,
or a skin color swap on a superhero does change that superhero, but I think it
adds a much needed level of depth and complexity. Imagine a Batman who was
black. How would police perceive him? Would have ever get the praise he
deserves or would he always be treated as a criminal just as bad as those he
pursues?

And no you don’t need to make him Batwing, or
Batkid, or some other bullshit Bat-deviation.All that does is place the character in a lesser position than the actual
Batman. You may not think this is important. But really it kind of is. There is
something call stereotype
threat.

You may not think it affects you, but it does. That is
its nature. Study after study (not linking to them here, because there are too
many and if you are really interested do the research your own damn self) has
shown that just being aware of a stereotype is enough for it to have an effect
on your performance. This Batman is “historically” white is just an extension
of Asians being good at math. And yes a positive stereotype for one group will
have negative consequences on another group. If you sit a group of people down
and say Asians always score better on this test, all those who are not of Asian
descent will do much worse than the control group.

That is my rant.

If you’re not helping the cause for equality, keep
your damn mouth shut.

About Me

Getting older means having survived another year on a planet that is trying to kill us, in a solar system that is a shooting gallery within a galaxy that has a black hole in the center in a universe that isn't even aware of our existence.